Houston’s 5 Sweet 16s in a row its best run since Phi Slama Jama

DALLAS >> Houston is home in the Lone Star State, playing as a No. 1 seed in the South Region and in the Sweet 16 for the fifth NCAA Tournament in a row.

With All-america point guard Jamal Shead, big man J’wan Roberts and coach Kelvin Sampson, the Cougars are in the midst of their best March Madness run since they made three consecutive Final Fours in the Phi Slama Jama era four decades ago. They were Big 12 regular-season champions this season after moving into that power conference, top 10 in the AP poll throughout and No. 1 for three weeks.

“I don’t think that we changed any type of motivation or changed what we’ve been doing all year, and for the past four years that I’ve been here,” Shead said Thursday. “They had a winning culture before I got here, and it kind of got instilled in me playing with guys like J’wan for four years and all the guys that were in front of us . ... We follow Coach Sampson, and I think that’s the real reason we’re here.”

The Cougars (32-4) play blueblood Duke (26-8) on Friday night at the home of the NBA’S Dallas Mavericks, about 250 miles from the Houston campus. Another Atlantic Coast Conference team, No. 11 seed North Carolina State (2414), takes on second-seeded Marquette (27-9) and former Texas coach Shaka Smart in the first Dallas game.

Duke was just getting started with coach Mike Krzyzewski and wasn’t in the NCAA field when Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler took the Cougars to the first of those consecutive Final Fours in 1982. The following year, Houston lost to coach Jim Valvano’s Wolfpack in a memorable championship game. The Cougars made the title game again in 1984, the year of Coach K’s first NCAA tourney with the Blue Devils.

Since then, there have since been only two NCAA tournaments played without Duke, which has five national championships. Second-year Blue Devils coach Jon Scheyer won a title as a player in 2010, and was an assistant coach for their most recent in 2015.